The Inner Battle,The Hollow Rising
'The White Threat' Takeshi Sawada walked into his small room at midnight exhausted. He lies down on his comfortable bed and shut his eyes. His fatigue came from the fight with Naoki Fukuda in the Soul Society when it came down to that final blow to determine the outcome. With a yawn, he scratched his head and felt a small piece of clay fall out of his black hair. He made a note of it but didn't think much of the bone white piece of clay. He once again shut his eyes and fell into a world of Black. When Takeshi opened his eyes, he found himself in a strange yet familiar world. Bright blue sky with large clouds racing above his head, stairs like the one he was standing on lined up laying horizontal. and Takeshi, who was wearing the black robes of a Shinigami's uniform with his zanpakuto sheathed. He knew this place that was his inner mind where he discovered his zanpakuto Sugetsu and received his shinigami powers. "Congrats kid, on attaining Bankai," said a shadowy voice that came from behind Takeshi. The voice came from a man who looked exactly like Takeshi except his entire body was ghost white including his hair; the only part that wasn't white were his eyes. The white were black and the pupil was red. These eyes stared straight into Takeshi's brown eyes. "I gotta say that will make a fine addition to the power I'm going to have when I take over your soul." He said finishing with a sinister laugh that had a shrill that made the hair on the back of Takeshi's neck stand up. He knew exactly who this man was and was ready to fight him since what happened in the Soul Society against Naoki . Takeshi looked at his hollow version of himself intently and stepped forward with his zanpakuto drawn. "Take over my soul huh," he said, his grip tightening on the hilt of his sword. "Well you're going to have to take it." The hollow laughed again with the same shrill and stuck his hand out to the side as a white version of Takeshi's zanpakuto crashed through the window below, hilt up, into the hollow's hand. Takeshi's Zanpakuto felt heavier than usually, so heavy that he could barely hold it. Damn, the fight with Naoki. He was still fatigued from that fight which would probably be why the hollow chose to attack now. One attack, one attack had to count. Takeshi raised the two katanas and say Eclipse to kill “'Sugetsu'”. Smiling, the hollow did the same. "Kyodan Tensuga!" The both cried in unison as an arc of blue condensed spiritual energy shot from Takeshi's zanpakuto and an arc or red from the hollows. Quickly the red sliced through the blue and inflicted its wound on Takeshi across the chest. Dropping his zanpakuto, Takeshi fell to the glass ground on his hands and knees. He couldn't move his body just like before in the fight with Naoki; he reached his limit. The hollow came, picked up the Takeshi's zanpakuto with his off-hand, and looked at it with great greed in his expression. "Don't you dare touch Sugetsu!" Takeshi was able to say before the hollow's white sandal connected with his face. "Why not," he asked holding the blade at its wielder's throat "I'm the one that deserves it not some punk kid who thinks too much of himself!" On that note, the hollow raised the blade above his head to deliver the finishing blow. The blade stopped mid-swing as a hand grabbed the blade and stopped it. Looking up, Takeshi saw the man who was his zanpakuto, the young Sugetsu, griping the blade and snatching it from the hollows white hands. Angry the hollow screamed "Kyodan Tensuga!" and unleashed another arc of red towards them. The last thing Takeshi remembers before blacking out was Sugetsu grabbing him by the collar and throwing him off the side of the stairs. Falling back to darkness. His eyes opened to find himself in the intersection of two streets surrounded by towering buildings. Above were the horizontal buildings blocking out most of the sky. It was silent and empty. The wound; Takeshi looked at the spot to where his wound was supposed to be to see that the only remains of it was the blood soiled on his robes. Sugetsu leaned against one of the buildings holding the blade that was Takeshi's zanpakuto. "You and I need to talk." He said quietly to Takeshi stabbing the blade into the ground. When we left Takeshi, he came home to relax after fighting with Naoki Fukuda only to be sucked into a fight for his soul against his inner hollow. Weakened and wounded by the hollow, Sugetsu came and saved Takeshi from curtain death… Sugetsu Zetsumei "Good Morning Takeshi!" Shinji Yoshikune yelled as he dashed into his friend's room to wake him up with a swift foot to the face. He looked around the room to see that it was clean and empty as usual when Takeshi was gone. The bed was unmade, which meant that he was here last night but left this morning. Looking around the room, Shinji found a small piece of clay on the floor beside the bed. It was bone white and had a trace of red paint on it like a hollows mask. What have you gotten yourself into this time sawada kun? ''Shinji thought tossing the piece of mask in the nearby garbage bin. A thundering roar sounded nearby followed by an enormous amount of spiritual pressure that felt like a hollow but at the same time very familiar. Takeshi; Shinji. He dove out the window above the bed and leaped from rooftop to rooftop following the spiritual pressure. he widened his eyes when he saw the source of the weird spiritual pressure. It was a hollow that seemed to be deformed with ghost white skin and long black hair that touched the ground. The mask had similar markings to the piece that Shinji found in Takeshi's room. The hollow consumed the souls of all the nearby people walking by it, unaware of its existence. Although the hollow has mostly taken over his soul, Shinji could still faintly feel Takeshi inside trying to get out. He had to buy time until his friend came back. With a heavy heart Shinji drew his zanpakuto. Sugetsu stood next to the sword that he stabbed into the ground "You and I have to talk." He told to Takeshi. Sugetsu long black hair and black flowing robes and always wore the same emotionless expression that Takeshi could never mistake. Rain began to pour down over them from the sky above. Soon a clash of thunder followed with a series of lightning that destroyed a horizontal building overhead of them. Glass and debris showered down about as fast as the raindrops. Takeshi dashed towards the nearest building for cover, trying not to get hit by the mixture of lightning and concrete that rained down from the sky. "As you can see, his influence is spreading over the place like a disease.", Said Sugetsu, appearing out of the darkness of the empty room that they both ended up taking shelter in. In his right hand, he held the zanpakuto. "Even now as we speak he is up on you world reeking havoc to the humans, probably to gather souls to stay strong." He said, leaning against the zanpakuto casually. Takeshi panicked, remembering getting taken over in Bankai fighting Naoki. "No." he declared, "I can't let that bring me down." He clinched his fist tightly and said, "I'm can't let everyone I care for and love get hurt because of me." He said with passion in his heart and fire in his resolve. He was ready to do whatever it took to defeat the hollow and get back to his life for a time. "Ok then listen up and listen well, I'm not going to explain it again" Sugetsu said handing Takeshi the sword. "You and I are going to train your limit to how long you can use Bankai until your soul reaches its limit. In order to do that you and I must fight except for one major rule: no Bankai, just Shikai so that the hollow cannot detect us so we can train longer. The one thing to be aware of is that time here and time up there are two different things. "But in order for you to train you limit you will have to reach your limit through Shikai." "How the hell do I do that?" "Very simple." Sugetsu said. Soon, a purple blade came from the young's robe. It was pure black from hilt to blade and had a guard that was shaped as a Swastika above the hilt. Takeshi right away recognized it; Sugetsu Zetsumei, his Bankai. "In order to push you to your limit, I must fight you with '''Sugetsu Zetsumei '''and push on until I can force you to break your limit. When that happens, you will be able to control Bankai for a lot longer than usual." Takeshi thought of how crazy the idea of training at this time was but still did knowing that if he ignored the training, he would never win against the hollow. He nodded and readied himself for the barrage of attacks that were to come, "Hit me with all you got." He said ready to face his own power. 'Ultimate Kyodan Tensuga' The hollow's claw tore into Shinji's shoulder with the efficiency of a blade. The captain shinigami used shunpo to back out and regain his footing against the hollow that was his friend. The spiritual pressure was starting to grow stronger and stronger with each passing second and shinji knew why; the hollow was winning dominance over Takeshi. With a blood shattering roar, the deformed hollow stretched the mask's mouth open and shot a attack call cero nocturno that threw Shinji back through five tall buildings of the seireitei's business district. The nearby people, who weren't crushed by the enormous spiritual pressure, screamed and ran from an hollow threat. So it had come down to this. Shinji extended his zanpakuto "Forgive me sawada kun." He said with tears in his eyes he cried out: "Ban-." It feels like he has been training for months now but he knew it only really been maybe a couple hours. Takeshi held the blade and tried to keep his eyes on Sugetsu but could barely see the speed and motion of Sugetsu Zetsumei. "I got you!" he cried striking at the black figure. Sugetsu became a blur as he step aside and countered with a stab through the ribs. Takeshi coughed blood and backed away allowing his wound to heal. Doe to the amount of power that Sugetsu has put into this training, fatal blow such as this one would heal however the pain would still be there. Takeshi gasped, feeling his limit to be close but it didn't matter. He would reach this limit only to be revived with the fatigue but the ability to move and fight. Only now did Takeshi truly realize how amazing Sugetsu Zetsumei is; the speed, the power, the motion, and the very look of the blade. If he couldn't attack him with a strike of his blade, he would have to attack everywhere around him as well. He held his blade up and swung it to the ground "Kyodan Tensuga!" he cried shooting out the blue arc to destroy his foe. Sugetsu cut through the arc of spiritual energy down the middle, splitting the arc in two. "Is this really the extent of what you can do," Sugetsu asked now behind Takeshi with the black blade to his neck. Takeshi whirled around and swung in across his chest only to miss and get hit with a black and white wave of spiritual energy that would have destroyed him if Sugetsu didn't hold his power back. "You should be able to defeat this attack, you should be able to destroy this building, and you should be able to destroy me. But however you cannot even lay a hit on me and we have been training for a long time. Do you really care about what happens if you lose this battle? Do you really want him to use you as a tool to kill everyone around you? Because it seems to me that you don't even care if your blade is used to destroy those you love." He said gathering more power for another attack. The words hit Takeshi hard and now he felt a fire deep within the pit of his gut. A fire that burned inside his soul. With all his anger, his might, his resolve, and his power he swung and released that fire "Kyodan Tensuga!" he roared releasing a tidal wave of his blue spiritual energy to combat the black and white that approached him. The attack broke through and caused a massive explosion that destroyed the entire half of the building. "Well done Takeshi," Said Sugetsu, appearing from the shadows. He put his hand on Takeshi's shoulder and for the first time ever, he smiled, "never forget that feeling, it is the one thing that separates you from him; the power to protect." The hollow stood at the top of the city of the boy's mind and saw the explosion in the distance. How fun it's going to be to attain the kid's power. White held up his white Sugetsu and watched it dissipate in the rain. "Now the time has come, to become the strongest there is but I have to kill the one who rivals me. Sawada Takeshi." He said then laughed that shrill laugh that echoed across the world in Takeshi's mind. It began to rain red. 'The Protector and Destroyer' Red rain poured around Takeshi from the darkened sky. The entire world in his mind was torn and broken in ruins. Debris littered the streets, lightning shot across the sky, and clouds were as black as iron. A patch of sunlight poured down in the distance; that's where he had to go, that was the way out. Sugetsu was no longer around, he was left alone in the dark streets. The clouds above began to close around the beam of light. He was running out of time. Takeshi dashed down the street to the only source of light left in the city. He ran and ran and ran until a white hand from a puddle grabbed his ankle and tripped him. More hands emerged from the puddles around him, pinning him down to the ground so he couldn't move. "The young did a good job in hiding you." the familiar voice of the white copy of Takeshi said. White emerged from an alley way with the white Sugetsu sword in hand. "It's a shame you had to fall for such a easy trap; I would have loved it if you had struggled, would have made the whole experience of killing you more enjoyable." White said as he drew nearer. Takeshi struggled to brake loose of the white hands' grip, but to no avail. "I'm not very good at doing this but it's worth a shot." He said. Takeshi began to focus his spiritual energy to his arms and pulled with all of his strength. Soon the hands gave way and he broke free. He drew his blade and charged at White full force. The clash of the blades rang out across the city. They matched each other move for move keeping at pace with one another. The light, I need to get to the light. He shadow stepped away from White and sprinted towards the light. Before he could reach it, a flash of red shot in front of him and White stood there blocking the way. "You're going to have to get through me if you want to get out of here," He said with a grin on his face, "and truth be told, I'm having the time of my life." White held his blade up. ''Never forget that feeling. Smiling, Takeshi held his up as well. "Kyodan Tensuga!" the both cried releasing waves of blue and red spiritual energy. The waves clashed and fought until finally the blue wave of energy overpowered the red and engulfed the hollow. When the smoke was clear, White was gone; nothing remained. It was over, he was destroyed. Exhausted, Takeshi began to walk toward the light. "It's not over yet…." White was behind him now with blood dripping from his head down. He wiped the blood of his face and looked at in his hand. He laughed loud that same shrill laugh he always did that overpowered the thunder. "This is gonna be fun, Sawada Takeshi!" He quickly charged Takeshi and swung his blade only to be blocked by a large pure black blade. Sugetsu was in front of Takeshi blocking the attack. "Quickly you don't have much time, the way out is almost shut," he said struggling to hold the hollow "hurry I'll hold him off!" Now understanding, Takeshi nodded and ran to the light "NO!" the hollow broke away and ran after Takeshi with murder in his red eyes. Seeing this opening Sugetsu shot a wave of black spiritual energy and hit the hollow in the back, knocking him down. They watched as Takeshi flew up through the sunlight into the sky. "YOU BASTARD!" White roared as he got up. "Now it's only you and I." Sugetsu said readying his blade for the tough fight ahead.